Performances of Inspectopedia will take place from 20 to 26 November. The Insectopedia exhibition is open from 10 November to 3 December. Visitors will need to buy tickets to attend performances, but the exhibition can be visited simply by registering for entry to
On 6 December, a meeting with Hugh Raffles will take place at the
Theatrical performance and exhibition based on the bestseller of the same name by the American anthropologist Hugh Raffles.
At first glance, Insectopedia is a project about insects: like Hugh Raffles’ book, it gathers together phenomena, facts, and stories related to the lives of these creatures. Yet what has really been created by the authors of Insectopedia—the director Polina Kardymon, the scenographer Anastasia Yudina, the dramatist Egor Zaitsev, the composer Vladimir Bocharov, and the video artist Mikhail Zaikanov—is a panorama of our relations with “the other.”
The installation space is darkened, and there are many objects on the floor. Please be careful when viewing.
Illustration: Anastasia Udina
Inspectopedia does not just tell us about beetles and flies, about how stick insects hide from prying eyes and why moths only fly at night. It reveals an encyclopaedia of human fears, the simultaneous admiration and revulsion we feel when faced not only with the incredible world of insects, but with all worlds that are inaccessible and incomprehensible to us.
The Insectopedia performance and exhibition study the format of the performative installation.Uniting live performance art with a stationary exhibition, the authors of Insectopedia seek to posit and answer the questions of whether exhibitions can be theatrical, whether scenography can exist separately from performance.
Inspectopedia is published in Russia by Ad Marginem.
Project team
Polina Kardymon is a director, artist, performer, and curator. She has worked as a director and producer at the Stary Dom and Globus theatres (Novosibirsk). She is a resident of the Contemporary Art Laboratory, and a curator of the PERFONDI laboratory. Kardymon works at the Inclusion theatre school and the ZVUK BUKV book club. She is of the founding members of the MYK art group, which works at the junction of contemporary art and postdramatic theatre. Kardymon was awarded a Golden Mask prize in the Experiment category for Childhood. Koromysli. Chapter 3 in 2023.
Egor Zaitsev is a dramatist, translator, and poet. He is a graduate of the Philological Faculty of Moscow State University. As a poet and translator, Zaitsev works with the Libra publishing house (The White Princess by Rilke, and Condor, an anthology of poetry of early German expressionism). As a dramatist, he collaborates with Polina Kardymon, Egor Matveev, and Daniil Posazhennikov. His poems have been published in Zerkalo magazine, Flags, TXT (France) etc. Zaitsev is the author of the libretto for the Relict musical and theatrical production shown at the Venice Biennale in 2022.
Vladimir Bocharov is a sound and interdisciplinary artist, a founding member of the Presidiomodelo group, the MYK and PROSO art groups. His theatre productions include Bobov the Giant (the Globus Theatre, Novosibirsk), The Idiot (Youth Theatre of the Komi Republic, Syktykvar), Mushrooms (MYK group and the First Theatre Studio, Novosibirsk), The Seven Samurai and Potudan River (Pskov Pushkin Academic Drama Theatre). Zaitsev participated in the the Desiring Machines exhibition and performative project at
Anastasia Yudina is an artist and curator. As a scenographer and costume artist, Yudina worked on the North production at the Arkhangelsk Youth Theatre (winner of a prize in the Experiment category at the 2021 Golden Mask awards), as well as on Encounter with a Butterfly and Benefit Concert for Roza Khayrullina (Point of Access Production Centre, Saint Petersburg), The Man from Podolsk (Liteiny Theatre, Saint Petersburg), Potudan River and Seven Samurai (Pskov Pushkin Academic Drama Theatre), Eight (Taganka Theatre), and Crime and Punishment (Tomsk Drama Theatre). Yudina also worked on the opera Bluebeard’s Castle (Perm Opera and Ballet Theatre) as a sculpture and costume artist.
Mikhail Zaikanov is an artist He has participated in numerous Russian and international projects, including solo exhibitions in Moscow, Saint Petersburg, Vladivostok, Croatia, and Montenegro. As a video artist and artistic designer, Zaikanov has worked with many theatres, including the Moscow Chekhov Art Theatre, the Meyerhold Centre, the Globus Theatre (Novosibirsk), the Taganka Theatre, the Oleg Tabakov Theatre, the Pushkin Theatre, the Praktika Theatre, Krasnoyarsk Theater for Young Spectators and many others. In 2016, Zaikanov won scholarships from Garage Museum (2016) and FRAME Foundation (Finland, 2016). He was a prize-winner at the Harlequin Festival for the video design of Children of the Raven (2020).
Director’s assistant
Evgeny Kaufman
Performers
Marina Belogubets, Gennady Fokin, Darya Makarevich, Polina Medikova, Leonid Prokofiev, Yulia Razumovskaya, Anna Sokolkova, Maxim Tikhomirov, Nikita Zelyony
Costume designer
Elena Zykova
Curator
Anna Ildatova
Producers
Ksenia Lukina, Darya Shadrina, Mikhail Yatskov
Technical team
Alexander Dolmatov, Artyom Kanifatov, Nikita Tolkachev
Information partner
Media specialist
Anna Kolpakova
